District of Columbia Attorney General Irvin Nathan issued a lengthy letter today explaining the decision not to prosecute David Gregory “despite the clarity of the violation of this important law,” despite rejecting NBC’s claims of a subjective misunderstanding of the law, and despite vowing vigorous enforcement of gun laws.

Emily Miller of The Washington Times, who has written extensively about the overly aggressive enforcement of D.C. gun laws, including as to high capacity magazines, reacted as follows:

It is shameful that the politicians running the nation’s capital have sent the clear message that there are two systems of justice in the city: one for the rich and powerful and one for everyone else.

It further undermines public confidence in such decisions to find out that Nathan knew Gregory and his wife, high-powered attorney Beth Wilkinson.

Anne dug up the connection in which in 2011 Nathan and Wilkinson participated together in a charity mock trial for the Washington, D.C. Shakespeare Theatre Company (emphasis in original):

In this town full of lawyers it should be no surprise that this event sold out in 44 seconds….. The attorneys were Beth Wilkinson a partner at Paul Weiss (and wife of David Gregory, aka the Silver Fox, who was snapping pictures like a proud hubby!) and Irv Nathan, Acting Attorney General for DC. Both were hilarious and Beth looked so great in her black dress and patent leather heels, I was totally motivated to stick to my overly arduous diet.

Whether this connection meant Nathan had to recuse himself is not a conclusion that people need to jump to.

What’s important is that the connection reinforces public perception, as Emily Miller put it, of one law for “the rich and powerful and one for everyone else.”

James Brinkley didn’t participate in mock trials with Irvin Nathan at the Washington, D.C. Shakespeare Theater. He participated in a real trial in court against Nathan’s office, as told by Miller several days ago, If you’re not David Gregory …:

Despite the evidence Mr. Brinkley had been legally transporting the gun, his attorney Richard Gardiner said the D.C. Office of the Attorney General “wouldn’t drop it.” …. Mr. Brinkley refused to take a plea bargain and admit guilt, so the matter went to trial Dec. 4. The judge sided with Mr. Brinkley, saying he had met the burden of proof that he was legally transporting.

Comments

It is plain as day that the corrosively biased governing class in Washington DC is in cahoots with the media branch of the Democrat Party. That may appear an insurmountable obstacle to the even-handed application of justice.

But the Byzantine parallels are also becoming less murky, and the day may well come when the privileged enforcers may fall out with their privileged media lackeys, over some divison of the spoils. Should they decide to settle their differences with a power struggle (as the privileged Greens and Blues did in Constantinople), who’s to say that a modern Justinian and Belisarius would not declare a pox on both houses, and send thirty thousand of their partisans to the happy hunting grounds? Such is one possible outcome of the common desire by media and Democrats to scrap the Constitution and institute unappealable rule by some noble Knowitall.

Why does not a claim of “selective prosecution” now become a defense for everyone else? That should always be the situation when it becomes clear when there are two systems of justice. The accused should select the system he likes best.

I wonder if the fact that the Gregory children and the Obama children attend the same, ” Friends” private school which I understand has armed guards in addition to the Secret Service detail factors into the ultimate decision on Gregory ?

Some just have more skin in the game, while others less or none, even though we are all supposedly in the same game with the same rules. Not surprising at all, except that it is getting more blatant as time goes by and there is no longer any attempt to mask what is happening.

the next time someone in DC who has no criminal record, not even a parking ticket, but happens to have this same type thing, will the DC Atty General be letting them off as he did for his buddy David Gregory??

Since this is the standard, this will be applied to everyone, right? and if not, won’t attorneys be using this argument for their clients?

If I had the stones, the money, and the time, I’d head to DC to make a speech about the 2nd Amendment on a street corner while waving a “high capacity” magazine. The inevitable prosecution would have to contend with their new-found 1st Amendment exception to laws that violate the 2nd Amendment…

Since this is the standard, this will be applied to everyone, right? and if not, won’t attorneys be using this argument for their clients?

Some will certainly try. But the public reports of the attempt will so distorted by the media lackeys that – unless plaintiffs can punch through the slanders with a clear and unanswerable ‘equal justice under law’ argument – the plaintiffs will end up painted as spoiled white males, getting their just deserts via ‘social justice’.

I’m sure the applicability will depend on whether you know people and have a sufficiently patrician name. Odds are that if your name is appended with an initial (i.e. J-Biggie, P-Diddy), a food item (i.e. Porkchop, Catfish) or if most of your precious metals investments are in your teeth or hanging from your neck, you’re probably not going to get the David Gregory break.

Hear, hear! This is the way to get revenge, not just impotently sputtering about it on the Internet. Alinsky once again shows the way: make them live up to their own rule book; hurt the individual rather than the institution. If the Ethics Committee of the DC Bar blows it off, go after the individuals who sit on it and harass and embarrass them too.

If it wasn’t for the right wing/tea party extremists, Gregory would never have been put into position to expand the bounds of journalism, having to demonstrate the utter destructivity of that which he cusp bravely in one hand.#liberallogic

[…] Laws are for little people, so David Gregory won’t be prosecuted for possessing a high capacity rifle magazine in the District of Columbia. It probably helped that Gregory and his wife Beth Wilkinson know D.C. Attorney General Irvin Nathan. […]